I’m advocating for a bill, H-3588, that will solve the problem that was left unsolved with the so-called Confederate flag compromise of 2000. As I wrote in a recent letter to the editor, “The bill calls for the state to fly the Confederate flag on Confederate Memorial Day to honor the Confederate soldiers and to fly the state flag on all other days.”
That’s all the bill does, and that’s all that we can hope to achieve in any reasonable time frame. It’s not what I want, but it is a very good solution to today’s problem, and it can and should get passed into law.
For our state, I would prefer what I called “Decommissioning the Confederate flag.” Personally, I would prefer no flag and no flagpole and no holiday and moving the Confederate Soldier Monument somewhere — off to the side, at least. The flag and the flagpole are not needed. The holiday is actually OK, but it should be renamed Civil War Day or something. The monument itself is good, and it should be on the grounds, just not in the front. The very front of the grounds of the State House is for other things, for example a Christmas tree in December.
What I am working toward is not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good, as the saying goes. Passing H-3588 would be very good for everybody. It would be very good for South Carolina and the NAACP to end the boycott and declare at least a partial victory, so we can host NCAA tournaments.
I’m so convinced that H-3588 will solve the problem that I’ve developed many arguments that support it. I’ve presented these arguments here on this blog. Some of the arguments, probably most, have been for regular people to use to try to convince flag-supporters that H-3588 would be good for them.
I’ve even argued that passing H-3588 cements the flag, the monument and the holiday together, making them more solid, not less.
After all, we have the number one flag-supporter in all the world running our state government, and that person is The Red Rooster, Sen. Glenn F. McConnell, of the SCV Secession Camp #4. I don’t think that we can get anything passed while he runs our government, and he’s in a safe district. But, I’ve got to try to get something passed, and so, what we’ve got is H-3588.
Given that McConnell runs our government, my strategy is to advocate for a solution that he cannot defeat: 1) Consistent with 2000 compromise, 2) Honors Confederate soldiers, 3) Resolves the NAACP’s concerns without agreeing with them, 4) Forces McConnell to argue that he prefers to fly the Confederate flag instead of our state flag.
Where will we be compared to other states if we do get H-3588 passed?
What does NC do? Don’t they raise the 1st Confederate flag on both Robert E. Lee’s birthday and on Confederate Memorial Day (May 10th)? If we can move from where we are to better than where NC is (only 1 day instead of 2), then that will be pretty amazing and wonderful. What does Alabama do? Don’t they have a Confederate Memorial on the grounds of their State House, and isn’t there some Confederate flag flying there year-round? Their Memorial is off to the side, though isn’t it?
It would be very good to get a Confederate flag to fly on only 1 day every year instead of 365, especially when there’s no state business going on that 1 day. I think the best flag to fly on that 1 day would be the Confederate battle flag (what’s there now) and keep May 10th as honoring the soldiers BUT NOT the “free to own slaves” cause.
Many Confederate soldiers volunteered, but many others were drafted or otherwise coerced into service, and all of the soldiers surrendered, following the orders of Robert E. Lee or other military leaders. The only problem with the 1 day only solution is what to do with the flagpole the other 364 days.
I don’t like an empty flagpole. And I don’t like having the flagpole being taken down if that means that the neo-Confederates will fly a flag on that 1 day only from atop the dome. The good things about choosing our state flag for the other 364 days are 1) we can use the “confusing about sovereignty” argument and 2) people like our state flag better than the Confederate flag.
The bad thing about choosing our state flag for the other 364 days is that our state flag was used as a Confederate flag; our state flag was the national flag of the seceded nation of SC, and it was flown often after the war to protest reconstruction. Here’s a description from a news article that quotes K. Michael Prince’s book:
In fact, the battle flag seen today throughout the South did not fly above South Carolina’s capitol during the Civil War and was not the flag that drew the ire of black S.C. legislators in the years after the war.
It was the Palmetto Flag – the one with the Palmetto tree and crescent moon – the black legislators despised. That flag didn’t officially become the state’s flag until early in 1861 during the Civil War, according to Prince.
“More than any other emblem, this flag represented the state and its citizens during that conflict,” Prince wrote. “In 1869 a resolution calling for the display of both an American and a South Carolina banner atop the State House passed the state legislature, but only over the objections of several black state senators. For them, the state flag remained a symbol of the state’s defiance against federal authority and of the treachery that had led to war.”
My opinion is that choosing the state flag for the other 364 days is the best solution and that we should just continue to point out that our state flag has a long and varied history in our state and that it has come to define all of us who work and make our homes here in South Carolina.
That’s one of the parts of this whole issue that makes South Carolina’s situation different from the state flag situations of Georgia (now resolved) and Mississippi. Our issue is about a third flag we fly — not our nation’s flag (Stars and Stripes), not our state’s flag (Palmetto), but a third flag (Confederate battle flag).
Our issue is not our state flag, and anyway, changing our state flag would be very, very difficult. After all, most, if not all, of the state flags of the southern states have ties to the Confederacy somehow. Georgia’s new flag is quite similar to the 1st Confederate, but with Georgia’s seal in the middle of the circle of stars. I’m sure that you know what Mississippi’s flag looks like and the result of a statewide vote to change it.
To close this long post, I just want to say, let’s solve this problem, now, not 20 years from now, not 50 years from now, not 100 years from now, but now. Because the boycott is not going away, the NCAA ban is not going away, and South Carolinians want the problem solved.
Let’s get H-3588 passed. Let’s fly our state flag out in front of the State House.
11 Comments
July 24, 2009 at 10:24 am
This symbol of hatred,violence, and genocide should have been taken down long ago. It is an insult to the people of South Carolina to have a flag like this flying on State House grounds.
July 24, 2009 at 9:10 pm
Bull S#*!
September 24, 2009 at 10:19 am
Should the American flag be removed for “hatred, violence, and genocide” The US is responsible for the native americans demise but it is not an issue that the flag that flew we they were killed under flies on top of the state house. I am do not understand why we waste our time and money to fight this issue. The confederate flag does not belong on the state house. It is in a location where it should stay to be a landmark. The Civil War only lasted less than 4 years; slaves were brought to America under the American Flag not the Confederate. The south and NORTH used slaves under the American Flag for 75 years.
September 24, 2009 at 4:46 pm
The issue is not “hatred, violence, and genocide.” The issue is why we fly a flag that is neither our state flag nor our national flag. We should not fly any third flag.
November 21, 2009 at 6:58 pm
The difference is that this nation is founded on equality while the CSA was founded – in the words of the Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens, – on “exactly the opposite idea,” that is, that “the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition.”
This was a government – and is thus a flag – founded on the inherent idea of racism. America may have seen its share of wars, racism, and awful things…but it STANDS for equality because that is what it was founded on (something Stephens admits and then decries as against natural truth).
July 25, 2009 at 9:43 pm
Nice comment Cecil, you must support the flying of the flag.
July 26, 2009 at 3:15 pm
Good stuff Mike. Please keep spreading the word about this issue. South Carolina can’t move forward until it moves on.
July 26, 2009 at 4:58 pm
I think there’s been a lot of progress made on the Confederate flag issue: People understand that the legislature is causing the problem and that the legislature can resolve the problem.
Thankfully, a legislator, Rep. Grady A. Brown, is ready to act. He’s ready to sponsor or co-sponsor a bill, according to his letter to the editor below.
August 6, 2009 at 2:03 pm
I am from the Deep South, so I have no axe to grind against rednecks or any other southern stereotypes…The confederate, or “rebel” flag, was and always will be associated with racist ideas of white superiority which resulted in mass slavery. Blacks at that time were considered little more than beasts, and families were routinely split apart and sold at auction like so many cattle. And even after the war was over, the south, who would not stop their institutionalized evil against a race of human beings, instituted Jim Crow laws in an effort to keep the Black man down. Most Southern politicians after the war were a cowardly, immoral, and shameful lot, all the while believing that God was really on their side. He wasn’t.
No system of evil can stand forever, and so it was with slavery and then segregation in the South. These days the South is the most integrated part of the country, and has put aside tribal hatreds and vigilante law in favor of equality and justice. The confederate flag stands as a disgraceful and evil reminder of all that was wrong with the southern mindset of a bygone age…But is it truly gone? Until morally ignorant men stop trying to give a sense of dignity and honor to a symbol that deserves neither, we will keep on debating an issue that was decided long ago. The south was totally humiliated in its loss, and it needed to be. That is what needs to be remembered here, not a symbol of hatred, but how much bloodshed it took to tear away that symbol of evil from a racist government of morally primitive men. Some say that the confederate soldier fought “bravely”, but was it brave to fight for the subjugation of an entire race of human beings? It’s not about the fight; it’s what the fight’s about. Slavery is what the Civil War really was all about. And that is why Abraham Lincoln will always be honored and remembered, and almost no one remembers Jefferson Davis thank God. Let us grieve that there was even a confederate flag at all, not salute or celebrate it, and let us never forget just how tragically wrong the south truly was, and in this case, still is…It is a time of remembrance perhaps, but not to honor…to mourn.
July 28, 2009 at 12:32 pm
David:
“This symbol of hatred,violence, and genocide should have been taken down long ago. It is an insult to the people of South Carolina to have a flag like this flying on State House grounds.”
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Most flags have some history of ‘hatred’ or violence behind it…but the only flag on the State House grounds with a history of Genocide is the United States flag.
August 6, 2009 at 2:30 pm
The reason we fly the United States flag is because South Carolina is a state in the United States of America and the Stars & Stripes is our national flag.
The reason we fly the South Carolina flag is because it is our state flag.
The reason we fly the Confederate flag is unclear, to say the least. It’s not our national flag, and it’s not our state flag. That’s the issue.
As Marilyn Rej beautifully wrote in a July 30, 2009 letter to the editor to The State: